Gracious Rain

July 3, 2012July 3, 2012

Orchard Love

I saw this sweet little game online the other day, that reminded me of Hi-ho Cherry-O from when I was a kid. After looking closer though, I found out that it’s even better. It’s called Orchard and as you can see, even a three-year-old can play it.

First, you load the trees up with fruit–green apples, yellow pears, blue plums and red cherries.

Then somebody rolls the dice.

If you roll a color, you get to pick a fruit from the tree…

and put it in your basket.

But if you roll the dreaded crow, you have to take a puzzle piece that will put a picture of the nasty old bird together. Now then, here’s the good part–with this game, the kids are actually cheering for each other instead of duking it out, because the point is to pick all the fruit before the bad-guy crow shows up and eats everything. There’s no competition between players –only working together against the crow.

Isn’t that a fabulous idea? No, no, this is not a paid advertisement. I was just so happy to find such a perfect game for Miss Chompy, Lily and the Beck, that I wanted to tell somebody about it. And so you know, the kids and I have played the game about 25 times in the last few days.

Yeah, that’s us.

Playing till we drop.

Heh, heh.

Tell me~ have you every heard of Orchard? What are your kids favorite board games?

PS– Gracious Rain is in 2nd place in the KSL Best Local Blogger Contest!! If you’d like to vote go right here and register…then vote. Thanks- thanks!!

July 2, 2012July 17, 2012

::Popcicle Cupcakes Toppers::

Seriously now, have you ever seen anything so adorable in all your life? Popcicle cupcakes toppers–just in time for your summer barbeque dessert.

And best part of all–they don’t melt, but they sure do look like they could help you beat the summer heat, even if they are just pretend frozen pops.

Here’s how you do it~

Find flat toothpicks and snap 24 of them in half–you are only using the bigger of the two halves. Throw the other ends away.

Choose whatever color Mike & Ikes that suite you. I got Tropical Typhoon because I simply HAD to have the color blue in my Popcicle pile.

Now take the stick and very carefully…

push it into the flat end of each candy piece.

And there you have the sweetest little Barbie-sized, no drip “popcicles.”

In fact, if you’re like me, you’ll have a hard time stopping yourself once you get started.

I actually couldn’t keep myself from playing with all those pretty, bright colors!

These would make a perfect Summer Birthday party treat. But be sure to help younger children take the sticks out before they eat their cupcake.

So simple and fun and summer-y and most of all–

totally cool.

Heh.

PS– Gracious Rain is in 2nd place in the KSL Best Local Blogger Contest!! If you’d like to vote go right here and register…then vote. Thanks- thanks!!

July 1, 2012

{ The One }

“Jesus Christ is our greatest example. He was surrounded by multitudes and spoke to thousands, yet He always had concern for the one.”

~Joseph B. Wirthlin

June 29, 2012June 30, 2012

~The Smoking Ghost~

Hey~ I want to show you an amazing new picture book about tobacco prevention–a very important subject for parents to help their kids understand and be prepared for. The illustrations are adorable, detailed paper cut art–which you should see up close to fully appreciate.

Aside from the valuable timely message that this book will help families with, I’m particularly excited to promote it in any way I can because the amazingly talented writer and illustrator is my very own niece– Emily!! Yes, yes–she is one clever gal, I’ll tell you, and we’re proud to call her ours.